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04-18-2020, 08:58 PM | #11 |
Join Date: Apr 2016
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Re: Weighty problem when attempting to reproduce Blaster Cannon canon; Pyramid #3/37
In the 'BYOBlaster" rules in Pyramid;
The curves; (dice/n)^3 Empty Weight, (dice^2)*Generator factor*Array range combined with the Tech Level advancement for Shots-per-dice-per-C-Cell do 'effectively' increase damage at later tech levels. They just don't work well when going down tech levels. This is understandable. TL9 to TL10 lasers in UT, use a different technology for Lasing medium, for example. Even speculative future parallel technologies don't usually fit well on the same curve, because they're parallel. I suspect that while going over his outline and napkin math the author said; "TL11 cannon, check; 4000lb. TL10 cannon... why?! Aw hell; TL10 cannon, half dice, 4000lb." The pyramid rules are a little bit simple; to enable doing the figures long hand on the back of a character sheet, probably. They kind of can, but don't really, facilitate engineering different form factors with different technology through different tech levels. If you're building REALY BIG GUNS, you should probably be using the rules from spaceships. (the old Mecha book is kind of fun too.) For middle weight lasers and blasters here's what I did to Mr. Pulver's very nice system. Added a TL generator efficiency modifier TL9- 1.5, TL9 1.2, TL10 1, TL10+ 0.8, Created individual weight factors for generators on IR Lasers, MS Lasers, Particle beams, each has a different modifier for single shot through gatling i.e.; MS Laser; Single shot 1, Semi auto 1.25, Rapid Fire 1.5, Full Auto 2, "gatling" 2.25 Added new "Rb" (from range; pg 13) factors for each type of beam in each form factor category i.e.; Blaster pistol 26, rifle 32, cannon 50. I also did some stuff that's very specific to my setting and probably unrealistic like changing the 'shots-per-c-cell' efficiency. And writing in a function for maximum shots per turn or your power cell explodes. |
04-18-2020, 09:15 PM | #12 | |
Join Date: Dec 2013
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Re: Weighty problem when attempting to reproduce Blaster Cannon canon; Pyramid #3/37
Quote:
I fear you are right in that the article may have been written with design-on-the-fly in mind; either that, or space constraints. In any case, I view design such as this something to do up-front, and have a much more forgiving view towards up-front math than I do for in-play math. So I would much rather have the full formula than a "back of the character sheet" formula. |
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04-18-2020, 09:18 PM | #13 | |
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: On the road again...
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Re: Weighty problem when attempting to reproduce Blaster Cannon canon; Pyramid #3/37
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__________________
"Life ... is an Oreo cookie." - J'onn J'onzz, 1991 "But mom, I don't wanna go back in the dungeon!" The GURPS Marvel Universe Reboot Project A-G, H-R, and S-Z, and its not-a-wiki-really web adaptation. Ranoc, a Muskets-and-Magery Renaissance Fantasy Setting |
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04-18-2020, 09:40 PM | #14 | |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Wellington, NZ
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Re: Weighty problem when attempting to reproduce Blaster Cannon canon; Pyramid #3/37
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Rupert Boleyn "A pessimist is an optimist with a sense of history." Last edited by Rupert; 04-18-2020 at 09:43 PM. |
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04-18-2020, 09:43 PM | #15 | |
Join Date: Dec 2013
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Re: Weighty problem when attempting to reproduce Blaster Cannon canon; Pyramid #3/37
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To make them equivalent, damage dice can be multiplied by 4 and then have any adds, well, added, or DR can be divided by 4 and then compared to dice with fractional adds (such as 7.5d instead of 7d+2). |
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04-18-2020, 09:49 PM | #16 | |
Join Date: Jul 2008
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Re: Weighty problem when attempting to reproduce Blaster Cannon canon; Pyramid #3/37
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__________________
I don't know any 3e, so there is no chance that I am talking about 3e rules by accident. |
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04-18-2020, 10:18 PM | #17 | |
Join Date: Dec 2013
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Re: Weighty problem when attempting to reproduce Blaster Cannon canon; Pyramid #3/37
Quote:
Anyway, let me try that again. On page 14 of Pyramid #3/37, in the article "Beam and Laser Design", under the section header "Shots", it lays out the math for how many shots a power cell can hold. The math uses 1d damage as the baseline for the number of shots provided to various weapons from a "C" power cell of Tech Levels 9, 10, 11, and 12. The short of it is, you take the number of shots provided to a 1d damage weapon by that tech level, number, and size of power cell, and divide it by the dice of damage, cubed. For example, using a theoretical power cell which provides 1,000 1d shots, and a theoretical weapon which does 7d+2 damage, the formula would be: (1,000) / 7.5^3 = 2.3 (we then drop the fraction to get 2 shots). There are two relevant parts for the first conclusion. The first one is that power usage scales with the cube of the damage dice. The second is that energy weapon efficiency is flat; for example, as I understand it, laser weapons are 50% efficient. The efficiency term, being a flat number, can then be dropped when deriving how much "raw power" a shot has - it's "actual value". So, for example, 7d+2 (7.5d) damage has a raw power, in abstract numbers, of 421.875. From there, a DR of 30 has a raw power, in abstract numbers, of 27,000. Making these "raw power" numbers equivalent is then a matter of multiplying 7d by 4, then adding 2, getting a total of 30, and a "raw power" of 27,000. Or, dividing the DR by 4, getting a total of 7.5, and a "raw power" of 421.875. I am uncertain of the utility of this, but it does give us a linear scale for damage and DR. |
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04-18-2020, 10:34 PM | #18 | |
Join Date: Jun 2006
Location: On the road again...
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Re: Weighty problem when attempting to reproduce Blaster Cannon canon; Pyramid #3/37
Quote:
__________________
"Life ... is an Oreo cookie." - J'onn J'onzz, 1991 "But mom, I don't wanna go back in the dungeon!" The GURPS Marvel Universe Reboot Project A-G, H-R, and S-Z, and its not-a-wiki-really web adaptation. Ranoc, a Muskets-and-Magery Renaissance Fantasy Setting |
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04-18-2020, 11:03 PM | #19 | ||
Join Date: Jul 2008
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Re: Weighty problem when attempting to reproduce Blaster Cannon canon; Pyramid #3/37
Quote:
It seems like you're trying to assign some manner of general significance to the cube of the dice of damage, but you're not explaining exactly what significance. I suspect you're over-broadening it. Not all weapons have damage scale as the cube root of energy. (You seem like the kind of person who might enjoy this article quite a bit. I believe we've been told that that's not exactly the official behind-the-scenes calculations but it's pretty close.) Quote:
One, you've changed from talking about damage to talking about DR without making any kind of transition, again. Secondly, you slipped up on the math. Your metric was the cube of the dice of damage. If you're treating 'DR' and 'damage' as interchangeable, you should have cubed 30/3.5 and gotten 629.7.
__________________
I don't know any 3e, so there is no chance that I am talking about 3e rules by accident. |
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04-18-2020, 11:23 PM | #20 |
Join Date: Aug 2004
Location: Wellington, NZ
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Re: Weighty problem when attempting to reproduce Blaster Cannon canon; Pyramid #3/37
I was talking about what we see in UT. In UT is can be seen from how the number of shots and damage scales in pistols and rifles that damage is proportional to the cube root of power (as with Pyr #3-37). The rules for using power cells as explosives imply that for TL10-11 there's a four-fold increase in energy density for power cells (also as in Pyr #3-37). These two things, combined with the doubling of damage for the same weight of the TL11 cannon compared to the TL10 cannon mean that the TL11 version must have either times the power output for the same weight, and twice the efficiency.
How you should reconcile this with Pyr #3-37 I can't tell you.
__________________
Rupert Boleyn "A pessimist is an optimist with a sense of history." |
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blasters, cannons, houserules, pyramid #3/37, rules |
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